This was not a circumstance to escape Harleigh, who, indescribably touched, fervently exclaimed, 'And what, now, shall sunder us? Pardon my presumption if I say us! What is the power,--the earthly power,--while yet I live, and breathe, and feel, that can now compel me to give up the rights with which, from this decisive moment, I hold myself invested? No! our destinies are indissolubly united!--All procrastination,--all concealment must be over! They would now be literally distracting. Why, then, that start?--Why that look?--Can you regret having shewn a little feeling?--a trait of sensibility?--O put a period to this unequalled, unexampled mystery! I am yours! faithfully, honourably yours! Yours to the end of my mortal existence; yours, by my most sacred hopes, far, far longer!--You weep?--not from grief, I trust,--I hope,--not from grief flow those touching tears? Open to me your situation,--your heart! Here, on this sacred, and henceforth happiest spot, where first you have accorded me a ray of hope, let our mutual vows be plighted to all eternity!' Juliet, whose whole soul seemed dissolved in poignant yet tender distress, cast up to heaven, as if imploring for aid, her irresistibly streaming eyes; when, caught by some shadowy motion to turn them towards the church, she fancied that she beheld again the female, whose appearance and vanishing had been forgotten from the excess of her own emotions. Startled, she looked more earnestly, and then clearly perceived, though half hidden behind a monument, a form in white; whose dress appeared to be made in the shape, and of the materials, used for our mortal covering, a shroud. A veil of the same stuff fell over the face of the figure, of which the hands hung down strait at each lank side. Struck with awe and consternation, Juliet involuntarily ceased her struggles for freedom; and Harleigh, who saw her strangely moved, pursuing the direction of her eyes, discerned the object by which they had been caught; who now, slowly raising her right hand, waved to them to follow; while, with her left, she pointed to the church, and, uttering a wild shriek, flitted out of sight. Could it be Elinor? Each felt at the same instant the same terrible apprehension. Harleigh sprang after her; Juliet, almost petrified with affright, was immovable. The fugitive entered the church, and darted towards the altar; where she threw her left hand over a tablet of white stone, cut in the shape of a coffin, with the action of embracing it; yet in a position to leave evident the following inscription: 'This Stone Is destined by herself to be the last kind covering of all that remains of ELINOR JODDREL: Who, sick of Life, of Love, and of Despair, Dies to moulder, and be forgotten.'